Chapter 16
Sixteen
Hayden
Sterling is lying on a towel out by the pool with his head resting on one of his arms, the other at his side as his face soaks up the sun.
His eyes are closed, and he has an earbud in his ear I don’t notice until I’m close enough.
He’s been out here for two days with me.
After the incident, we stayed at his place for one night and he woke up before me, packing a bag.
I set down an iced lemonade and he smiles up at me, reaching for the frosted glass. “Care to join me out here?”
“In a little bit. I have to answer some emails first and tell my next job about my last-minute change of schedule.”
His lips turn down. “Okay, well, hopefully you’ll at least be out here when I’m ready to do my daily skinny dipping.”
I laugh. “Daily, huh?”
Sitting up halfway, he sips his drink and spins the umbrella with his fingers. “While here, yes.”
“I’m okay with that.” I smile, adjusting my sunglasses, and he snorts, looking back at the sky while lowering his.
“I don’t see you hurrying with those emails.”
I bark out a laugh. “You’re right. Sorry. I’ll get right to that. You’re ordering me around like one of your assistants now, I see.”
He glances back at me, looking up enough for me to catch my reflection in his glasses. “No. I wouldn’t be sitting here, patiently waiting to be naked with any of my assistants.”
“Good. Let it stay that way.”
“Stop delaying it from happening and it will,” he snaps back, and a chuckle falls from my lips.
“Aye aye, captain.” I give him a salute and take off back inside.
I head into my office and take care of what I said I would, my eyes bouncing between the computer screen and the clock on the wall.
I thrum my fingers while I read a message from Lisa about the filming being delayed two more days.
That’s fine by me. Means more time locked in the house with Sterling, showing him he doesn’t need anything outside this little paradise I plan on sharing with him forever.
He wants to go to the beach; I’ll create one for him in the back yard. He wants a shaded patio to sip tea and read from; I’ll build him one. So many of the renovations I had done were done with him in mind.
I finish up my work, and when I return outside, he’s letting his robe fall to the ground and diving in the pool. Smiling, I take off my clothes and go in after him. We spend hours in the water, swimming, wading, and fucking, so many that by the time we get out, we’re both starving.
Sterling lifts himself out before me, his wet body shimmering in the fading sun, and he’s better than any sunset I’ve ever seen.
The way his thigh muscles squeeze when he walks and how much that perfect ass bounces when he increases the speed of his steps .
. . His skin is smooth and flawless, and the freckles only add to his perfection rather than taking away from it.
“Are you coming?” He whips his head back, smirking at me. “I need you to make me one of those famous sandwiches of yours.”
“Yeah. Wanted to enjoy the view a little longer.”
He scoffs, waving me off, and continues toward the house. I quickly catch up to him, pulling him to my side, and we both enter through the back, naked, not bothering with towels or clothes while we prepare the food or when we are sitting at the table.
Sterling always has to sit close enough to be touching me in some way, and I’m perfectly okay with that. There are times I still need him to be closer, to have a part of him overlapping me until his skin almost feels fused to mine, like we’re one person.
It’s like he knows it too, accommodating me, pressing tighter and binding us together in other ways, whether it be our fingers intertwining or his foot sitting on mine.
“How do you make these so good?” he says before polishing off the rest of the piece in his hand.
“I don’t do anything special. You just go too long without eating, so anything can taste amazing when you do that.”
He rolls his eyes, stealing a pickle from my plate. “I don’t go that long without eating. I keep snacks in my dressing room that you don’t see.”
“If it’s Lisa approved, then it doesn’t count.”
He chokes on a laugh, laying his head on my shoulder. “Can we watch a movie downstairs today?” He rubs his face on my shirt.
“What do you have in mind?” I say, looking down at his fidgeting fingers.
“I . . . I was thinking we could watch one of our movies.” He flits his gaze up at me. “You know, one of the movies we made together.”
“Yeah.” My lips stretch. “We can do that.”
I worry I won’t choose the right one at first, while I’m connecting my phone to the TV, but then my stomach unclenches when he sits closer to the edge of the couch with his hand on a closed fist, eyes glowing. He watches his hands, covered in my blood as he cuts me and licks it off his fingers.
He smiles, eyes glued to the screen, and his cock is growing hard.
He’s always his hardest when blood is involved.
He didn’t think I noticed in the shower when we were at his place and Kathy’s blood drenched the air, but I did.
It sent him on a new high and he’s getting hooked on it.
So much so that he sought it out that day on his own, lowering the machete again and again because he needed more, while lying to himself about it being for other reasons.
I don’t think he believes it as much as he did in the beginning, and I hope it’ll come easier next time. I’m hoping he’ll keep going until he’s awoken that part of him so much that there’s no return of who he once thought he was.
He’ll need more and more. I’ll keep giving it to him too. If I need to, I’ll give him the whole fucking world, punctured and bleeding, so he can roll around in it on camera.
Sitting back against the couch cushions, he spreads his legs, and I shove my hand between his thighs, stroking him slowly before I pick up the pace.
He forces his eyes wider, immersing himself in the scene unfolding in front of him, going back to that moment I knew was important for me to save.
We go back together, breaths heavy and our erotic sounds merging together.
When it’s over, I take out my video camera, telling him to show me what he thought the character in the last movie he made would do in bed with his romantic partners.
He tilts his head, lying back on the couch with his knees opening and closing. “What do you mean?”
“What would he do if they asked him to show them that side of him no one else gets to see? Something that would bring them closer to him?”
His brows push together. “I . . . I don’t know.”
“I think you do.”
“I’m not really him.”
“Yes, but I’m asking you to be him for this movie, and we’re going to pretend it is you. Right now you’re him, and he is you.”
He swallows so hard his throat bobs. “He’s a killer.”
“He is,” I agree.
“He would have liked what he did with that machete,” he adds, voice cracking.
“Yes. He likes making people bleed,” I say, stepping closer and handing him a clean nail file. “And so do you.”
“Am I . . . I’m still pretending, right?” With hesitant movements he takes the object from my hand and looks down at it, heat stirring in his eyes.
“If you want to be.”
“You also said that . . . that.” He chews on his bottom lip, his eyes moving from side to side.
“What did I say?”
“That I like making you bleed,” he stutters.
“Ah. That’s right. I did say that, didn’t I?”
“Yeah.” His face scrunches up. “That doesn’t mean I’m like him, though.”
“Of course not. You’re acting, remember?”
“I . . . yeah.” He twirls the nail file between his fingers, confusion furrowing his brow.
He doesn’t know what’s what anymore. If he needs to use the character, Ben, as a crutch for now, then I’ll let him.
Whatever helps him find himself more. “I liked making you bleed, but Ben likes making others bleed too.”
“And what else?”
“He . . . he likes the sounds skin makes when it’s breaking.”
“Show me. Show the camera.”
His nose flares. “You want me to pretend?”
“Sure, and if there’s an accident, then there is. That nail file is very slippery, and I tend to move a lot when I’m close to coming,” I say, shoving my cock in his face.
Licking his lips, his face moves closer, darting in and out of his mouth. “Accidents are known to happen.”
“Yeah. They are. Accidents happen all the time, baby. You can’t always prevent them. Sometimes they need to happen.”
His eyes lift to me and to my leaking tip. His tongue swipes over my slit and I shiver, running my fingers through his hair while squeezing my other hand around the camera.
“I . . . I should put this down to lessen our chances.”
“You should, but maybe you forget to, Maybe I distract you and come up to you while you’re filing your nails, grabbing your face.
” I hook my fingers around his chin, squeezing it tightly, and he winces.
“And part your lips with my cock before you realize what I’m doing. Before you have a chance to stop it.”
He looks down at his nails and waves his hand around. “I do need to do some upkeep. I’d hate to look a mess for the camera.”
“I know you would.” I release his face and he slides the file across the tips of his nails, spreading his fingers apart while humming to himself.
I laugh to myself, spinning around and acting as if I only just entered the room.
He’s still looking down, acting as if he doesn’t see me, and I grab his face roughly, holding him in place.
His arms lift, flailing, eyes widening in surprise as I force his mouth open with my fingers and shove my cock down his throat.
Not gentle or slow, I thrust my hips, pushing my straining cock over his tongue, again and again.
His eyes are bloodshot, face flushing and cheeks pushing out as I fuck harder.
The nail file stays in his hand and he loses balance, putting his hand anywhere he can, forgetting to drop the file first. The sharp edge digs right into the fleshy part of my hip, going deeper when my cock hits the back of his throat.
I bite back a scream, tugging on the strands of his hair, playing my part as the guy who’s so distracted by his flooding orgasm that he ignores the pain.
I shake from overwhelming pleasure, the pain only increasing it, and when I look down at the way he keeps pushing the weapon into me, I come down his throat, my vision all over the place.
His eyes roll back and he chokes around me, his throat tugging me harder before I pull out of him.
He’s trying to catch his breath, placing a hand on his knee, and when he sees where the other one is, his eyes flash with horror mixed with awe.
The first part is forced. What he thinks he needs to be.
“I hurt you.”
I shake my head, grabbing his wrist when he tries to flinch away. “No, baby.” I use his hand to slide the nail file up, creating a longer cut horizontally and his fingers shake as he looks on in a daze.
“It’s only a flesh wound. I have a first aid kit that’ll fix it right up.”
“You . . . the movie is over, isn’t it? I should stop now. Especially because there’s no way I’m unaware now. I mean, I never was but . . .” He’s not pulling away this time, his hand moving easily with mine as I cut up more of my thigh, the sting radiating.
“I haven’t called cut yet, have I?”
“No . . . Hayden . . . if I keep going . . . if I—”
“Shh. I want you to if you need to.”
“I don’t want to hurt you too badly.”
“You won’t. Move to the other side if you need to.”
“This is insane.” His breaths quiver and he slices through my other thigh causing me to scream through clamped teeth. “Why can’t I stop? I should want to, right?”
“Not while the camera’s still rolling. You can do whatever you want when it is, and it’ll be okay. The sky’s the fucking limit.”
His eyes light up and he makes another small hole before the first one, then drops the nail file, buzzing with endorphins.
He dips his head forward, sucking and licking at my injuries.
I shift uncomfortably but can’t move away from him.
He makes me hurt and bleed so good. The second major character usually survives, and he’s making sure I do during this shot.
He won’t care as much with the side characters and extras.
He’ll have more of a reason to kill them.
He’ll want the light to leave their eyes and will be happy about it even after I say, “End scene.”
The guilt will be gone, and he’ll be asking when the next scene will be filmed, patiently waiting for the time to come. That’s what stars do when they really love the work they’re doing.
He licks at me some more, his chin and lips red.
“Cut,” I say, leaning down to kiss him, and when I pull away, he grabs the file, rubbing the blood from the center, saying, “You sure we don’t have to do a redo?”
I smile, leaning down to cup his face. “I think we’re good for now, but I could change my mind after watching the clip again.”
“Does that mean another movie night tomorrow?” His eyes are begging.
I let out a soft dreamy sigh, spreading my blood along his lips. “Maybe even a movie morning after we have breakfast.”
“Okay, let’s get the first aid kit and hurry up to bed, then.”
I stifle a laugh. “If that’s what you want.”